Love

1. in Sula Love By Gemma and Marta

2. Love is not necessarily an emotion that people want to have, it can be an involuntary emotion, an extra weight of unwanted responsibility. Love can feel unfair or even be a burden. Morrison states that love is a rather “forceful moral emotion that drives people to actions both selfish and selfless, both beautiful and horrid.”

3. In Sula, there are many different kinds of love. There is the love: Between friends- (Sula and Nel) For a mother’s children-(Eva and Plum)* Unwanted love * For men-(Ajax and Jude) Sexual love. “All that time, all that time, I thought I was missing Jude,” ‘And the loss pressed down on her chest and came up into her throat. “We was girls together,” ‘she said as though explaining something. “O Lord Sula,” ‘she cried, “girl, girl, girlgirlgirl.” ‘It was a fine cry-loud and long-but it had no bottom and it had no top, just circles and circles of sorrow.” “When Eva, who was never one to hide the faults of her children, mentioned what she thought she’d seen to a few friends, they said it was natural. Sula was probably struck dumb, as anybody would be who saw her own mamma burn up. Eva said yes, but disagreed and remained convinced that Sula had watched Hannah burn not because she was paralyzed, but because she was interested.” “With the exception of BoyBoy, those Peace women loved all men. It was manlove that Eva bequeathed to her daughters.” (pg.41) “The Peace women simply loved maleness, for its own sake.” (pg.41)

4. Love is complex and intricate, driving people to be selfish and selfless: “ *Plum on the rim of a warm light sleep was still chuckling. Mamma. She sure was somethin’ he felt twilight. Now there seemed to be some kind of we light traveling over his legs and stomach with a deeply attractive smell. It wound itself-this wet light-all about him, splashing and running into his skin he opened his eyes and saw what he imagined was the great wing of an eagle pouring a wet lightness over him. Some kind of baptism, some kind of blessing, he thought. Everything is going to be all right, it said. Knowing that it was so he closed his eyes and sank back into the bright hole of sleep. Eva stepped back from the bed and let the crutches rest under her arms. She rolled a bit of newspaper into a tight stick about six inches long, lit it and threw it onto the bed where the kerosene-soaked Plum lay in snug delight. (Pg.47-48) ”

5. Sula had once overheard her mother, Hannah say that she loves Sula but does not like her, coming back to the aspect of unwanted love. Does Hannah not wish to love Sula? Does hearing Hannah say this about Sula make Sula not want to love her mother or love her less? If Sula hadn’t overheard her mother, would she still have just watched her as she burned to death? • "Did you ever, you know, play with us?" • –Hannah to her mother “I stayed alive for you!” --Eva to Hannah

6. Sources: • http://docs8.chomikuj.pl/301038063,0,0,Toni-Morrison-Sula.doc • http://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/3534.Toni_Morrison • http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/sula/section2.rhtml • http://urbandreams.ousd.k12.ca.us/lessonplans/sula/s_work_2.html

7. The end